Oracle, Sun merger excites channel

Oracle's $7.4 billion bid to acquire Sun Microsystems has excited solution provider partners of both vendors with the prospects of combining Oracle's software business with Sun's hardware and open source expertise, says ChannelWeb.

Solution providers were caught by surprise by the news that Oracle plans to acquire Sun, especially so close on the heels of the failed attempt by IBM to acquire Sun.

However, they said they expect the combination is one that will lead to more data centre opportunities for the channel, and could even lead to a newly enlarged Oracle going head-to-head with IBM and even with Cisco Systems, which is expanding its data centre presence with the introduction of its unified computer system platform.

WhipTail Technologies, a provider of solid-state storage appliances, has signed channel partner agreements with Arkay Systems, Managecast, Scale Datacom, TheAdmins and XLNsystems, according to Business Wire.

As a result, these partners will offer the WhipTail product to entertainment, healthcare, financial, government, education, legal, manufacturing, pharmaceutical, retail, service, sports and transportation customers across the US.

“As we make the move from being a regional to a national manufacturer of leading-edge storage technology, it is important to have partners with a larger geographical footprint,” said Ed Rebholz, CEO of WhipTail Technologies.

With the election of the most technology-savvy president in history, the government sector has quickly become one of the most exciting places to work if you're solution provider, reports Channel Insider.

Traditionally, the government sector was hampered by conflicting policies that made it a difficult place for a solution provider to thrive. Worse yet, government agencies are often perceived as being backwaters in terms of acquiring new technology and, from the perspective of many vendors and solution providers, a tough place to make a profit given the constraints of General Services Administration contracts.

But with massive sums of economic stimulus money available, a huge number of IT projects that leverage modern technologies are putting governments, particularly the federal government, at the leading edge of enterprise computing.